Hydrocarbons, such as oil and gas, are commonly obtained from subterranean formations that may be located onshore or offshore. The development of subterranean formations and the processes involved in removing hydrocarbons from a subterranean formation typically involve a number of different steps such as, for example, drilling a wellbore at a desired well site, treating the wellbore to optimize production of hydrocarbons, and performing the necessary steps to produce and process the hydrocarbons from the subterranean formation.
In conventional drilling operations, a drill bit is mounted in a bottom hole assembly (BHA) at the end of a drill string (e.g., drill pipe plus drill collars). At the surface a rotary drive turns the string, including the bit at the bottom of the hole, while drilling fluid (or “mud”) is pumped through the string. Drill bits typically include cones and/or hardened inserts to mechanically contact and drill through the subterranean formation, thereby advancing the wellbore. Unfortunately, as drilling progresses the drill bit teeth tend to wear out, leading to reduced drilling efficiency, increased mechanical specific energy on the bit, and additional trips to replace the worn drill bit.
Some drilling methods utilize lasers that are designed to cut into, and advance a wellbore through, a subterranean formation that would cause undesirable wear on a mechanical drill bit. However, full scale field implementation of such laser-based well drilling techniques has not been feasible, due to the cost of providing energy to power a downhole laser drill bit. In addition, such laser drilling methods are generally applied only to drill bits and perforation devices.